I did a lot of porting of code the past 7 years between Squeak and VW 
(and even some other dialects like Dolphin and VA). So yes, I do 
understand your frustration. But let's put some things in perspective - 
there is much more annoying things when porting these tools than a new 
which calls initialize. That is easily fixable. Different 
implementation of equality between VW and Squeak remain my absolute 
favorite, and have much, much, much, much more impact. Let's not go 
that road in the context of this thread. I think it merits its own (in 
Bled, at the ESUG event last month, some people (no, not only from 
Bern) discussed on trying to get the different dialects closer together 
- from the bottom up, not with some proposal from the top down. So 
we're open to suggestions.

PS: I also do quite some Prolog work. And there, as in Smalltalks, it 
annoys me that my code is not portable between different 
implementations/vendors...


On Tuesday, Sep 16, 2003, at 05:41 Europe/Zurich, Richard A. O'Keefe 
wrote:

> ducasse <ducasse at iam.unibe.ch> wrote:
> 	I do not understand why simply having a better default
> 	initialization schema that let everybody breaks the rule the way
> 	he wants is a problem.  But may be this is because Smalltalkers
> 	always want to cry that they are so cool but less and less.
>
> This is an ad hominem attack.
>
> What we don't have is agreement about whether
>  - the #new-calls-#initialize proposal *IS* better and
>  - whether it makes sense to have a "better" schema for something
>    which should very seldom be used at all.
>
> One of the things that has annoyed me in the past about Squeak
> is that some great new tool (like the Refactoring Browser) becomes
> available for other Smalltalks, finally (ah, finally, after a LONG
> wait) becomes available for Squeak, but then Squeak changes so I still
> cannot use it.
>
> We are ALL in agreement that Squeak should move forward.
> We do NOT all agree that this is best done by cutting ourselves off
> from other Smalltalks and other exciting Smalltalk tools.
>
> If ducasse at iam.unibe.ch is proposing to give us a tool which will
> automatically convert XML parsers, fancy browsers, &c to the new
> interface, well and good, the objection goes away.
>
> Put it this way:  I would regard it as a significant improvement to
> C if 010 meant ten, not eight.  While I am more than capable of writing
> my own preprocessor to fix this, or of patching the three compilers I
> have sources for, doing so would actually lock me *out* of using tools
> which have *higher* payoff for improving my code.
>
> So I am opposed to the proposed change not because I want Squeak to
> be mired in the past but because I *don't* want it to be mired in the 
> past.
>
> SqueakMap doesn't show me a version of the Refactoring Browser that I
> can load and use.  There is a SmallLint *tutorial*, but no SmallLint
> *package*.  This is ironic, because this is the tool that could help
> people with #initialize bugs AND OTHERS without any kernel change at 
> all.
> By flicking switches, I can see a version that says it might work in 
> 3.4,
> but of course I'm not using 3.4.  Try it, .... "MessageNotUnderstood:
> hasPrimitiveChangeClassTo:".  Nope.  I _can't_ use RB.
>
> Does anyone have a version of the Refactoring browser/of SmallLint
> that works in 3.5-5180 or 3.6 final?
>
> Is there anyone out there who understands my utter FRUSTRATION
> at the way I can never move forward in my Smalltalk practice because
> someone keeps yanking out the rug so that I can never use this tool?
> Anyone who *does* understand that will understand why I refuse to
> consider Kernel Changes in basic language mechanisms on the merits
> they might have if other Smalltalks and other Smalltalkers did not 
> exist.
>
> My other point is that simply *having* a "default initialization 
> schema"
> is in invitation to error.  Experts can cope with the present system 
> and
> with the proposed change.  I'm no expert, and I can.  The change is
> supposed to be for the benefit of beginners.  But to me this is like
> seeing a 4-year-old running with a knife in her hand and saying "little
> one, don't do that, let me give you this much sharper knife instead".
> I cannot see a change that makes it easier to do the wrong thing (or
> rather, something which is occasionally sensible but almost always 
> wrong)
> as "better" in any honest sense of the word.
>
>
Roel Wuyts                                                   Software 
Composition Group
roel.wuyts at iam.unibe.ch                       University of Bern, 
Switzerland
http://www.iam.unibe.ch/~wuyts/
Board Member of the European Smalltalk User Group: www.esug.org